


Nemesis

by BandanaBlue



Category: Alias Smith and Jones
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-23 08:26:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16155305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BandanaBlue/pseuds/BandanaBlue
Summary: Kid looks back at a moment in his life.





	Nemesis

The gun would be in my hand the second I needed it, that part I never had to think about. What I did need to think about was whether or not to kill the man. I'd done it before, back in the days when I didn't give the taking of a life too much thought. But now I do and that's down to one person — my partner, Hannibal Heyes.

Before I joined the Devil's Hole Gang I knew what I was — what my destiny was. Either fallin' in a blaze of bullets or swingin' at the end of a rope. But Heyes don't hold with killin'. If it wasn't for Heyes (damn him) I'd have put a bullet in Danny Bilson the second we stepped inside the Matherville saloon.

Seth was dead, his corpse picked apart by scavengers and what remained rotting on the parched desert floor. That would've been our fate too if it weren't for a little luck. Now I wanted revenge, more than I'd ever wanted anythin' in my whole life, more even than that damned amnesty. Heyes wanted it too. I had felt the hatred envelop him the moment he discovered that son-of-a-bitch had high-tailed it taking the gold, our horses and our precious water. Heyes don't often get angry but when he does it's real intense, a kinda dark heat burnin' within him. But he rarely lets fly. He just deals with it somehow until eventually it fades — not all of it; I'm sure a little stays smouldering for the rest of his days. Now, not a whole lot scares me in life but that sure does. I'm scared that one day it will end up killing him.

We both knew Danny Bilson was a crack shot and, as we faced each other, I could tell Heyes was nervous. It was one of only a handful of times when he couldn't look at me. He just stood there, rigid as a fence post, those big ol' brown eyes of his fixed on nothin' in particular, just the ground in front of him. I guess he didn't wanna watch in case it was me who fell. In the end it was the look on Heyes' face that decided it for me. I would shoot to kill.

Bilson tried his best to rile me, saying I was a no-good who was gonna come back in the dark and shoot him in the back. It didn't work. That kinda thing never does. Once I'm standing there, facing a man down like that, I put all my emotions away. Emotions will get you killed. You have to stay calm, loose and right there in the moment.

I knew what a snake Danny was so I kept my eyes on him the whole time. As I stood out there in the middle of the street and stuffed my glove into my vest pocket he kept right on talkin'. Talkin' and smilin'. Always smilin'. Oh, how I wanted to wipe that darn three-by-nine off his face for good! For the sake of the watchin' sheriff I had to make it look like I was walkin' away but I knew how this all works. Danny needed me to make the first move before he would draw. In the end I obliged. I moved, but not for my gun. That came a split-second later once he had reached for his.

A single bullet was all it took for Danny Bilson to die. I guess Heyes was the only person who knew how badly I wanted to empty the whole cylinder into him, all six bullets, but I settled for one. 

You know, I've never said this to Heyes but I'm sure he figured it out for himself. 

It felt good.


End file.
